A Health Care Worker at the Rally Today in Monument Square.

Health Care Workers Call for a Ceasefire at Monument Square Rally This Afternoon.

About 100 healthcare workers rallied today under record warm temperatures in Monument Square in downtown Portland.  Healthcare workers called for a ceasefire in Gaza that would facililtate the return of the hostages that remain in Gaza.

In introductory remarks Sarah Snyder, reminded the group  that they are demanding a ceasefire in Gaza.  ‘Healthcare workers in Maine and across the globe stand in solidarity with Palestinians struggling for liberation and healthcare.

:As healthcare workers we are horified to see those who are chronically ill, disabled, hospitalized or pregnant have to navigate a genocide funded by our government, while at the same time knowing everyone in Gaza is experiencing a mass disabling event.    As healthcare workers, we demand a world that not only treats symptoms, but also the root cause.  We call for an immediate end to this unconcionable violence while also acknowledging that true public health, … cannot exist within structures of racist or colonist violence.  We are seeing this in the most extreme tangible form in Gaza righ now.”

According to a flyer distributed at the Rally by Maine Voices for Palestinian Rights in 1948 the State of Israel was founded through the division of Palestine and 750,000 Palestinians were expelled and remain stateless refugees.  In 1967 Israel expanded its rule over all the territory of Palestine and began a brutal occupation of the West Bank and illegally annexed East Jerusalem.  Today, Israel is pursuing a genocide in Gaza that has shocked the world, in a war that began long before the Hamas attack of October 7.  Since 2008, Israel’s brutal siege has crippled Gaza’s economy and denied its population adequate food, water and medicine.

Multiple healthcare speakers spoke of the gut wrenching medical emergencies that exist within Gaza.